Richard Overton
Austin, Travis County, Texas
Marker Inscription
(1906-2018) Born in the Pleasant Valley community in Bastrop County to Gentry Overton Sr. (1877-1920) and Elizabeth "Lizzie" (Franklin) Overton Waters (1876-1939), Richard Arvin Overton gained notoriety as the oldest World War II veteran and living man in the United States. Richard moved to Travis County in early adulthood. He married his first wife, Novella Prince, on December 21, 1926, but soon after moved to East Austin.On September 3, 1942, at Fort Sam Houston, Richard enlisted in the United States Army. He served in the all-Black unit of the 1887th Engineer Aviation Battalion, serving in the South Pacific, including in Pearl Harbor, Iwo Jima and Okinawa. The 1887th Battalion was notable for clearing land to build "North Field," a strategic airstrip on the island of Guam, which later became Andersen Air Force Base. Overton left the Army in 1945 as a Technician Fifth Grade. Eventually, he earned the rank of Corporal and received an expert rife marksmanship badge, along with other military awards.He later married Wilma Galloway (1910-1988). The couple had no children. In 1948, they built a home in the College Heights subdivision in East Austin. Overton worked in a warehouse, and later, for the Texas Treasury Department as a courier. He retired in the 1970s. Overton continued to be a staple in his community. In the early twenty-first century, he was honored in the White House by the President as the oldest living World War II veteran. He died at the age of 112 and is buried at the Texas State Cemetery in Austin. (2023)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Born in 1906 in the Pleasant Valley community, Richard Overton enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1942 and served in the segregated 1887th Engineer Aviation Battalion across the Pacific, helping clear the airstrip on Guam that became Andersen Air Force Base. He returned to East Austin, built a home, and worked as a courier, becoming a beloved fixture of his neighborhood. Recognized in his final years as the oldest living American man and the nation's oldest World War II veteran, he was honored at the White House before his death in 2018 at age 112.
Why it matters
Overton's long life bridged the era of Jim Crow military segregation and 21st-century national recognition, honoring the Black servicemen whose labor and sacrifice helped win the war even as their country denied them equality.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
Richard Overton was born in 1906 in rural Bastrop County, in Central Texas. Jim Crow laws governed nearly every part of Black life in Texas then, and farm communities like Pleasant Valley held families who were often only a generation or two out of slavery. Like many rural Black Texans, Overton moved toward the city as a young man. He settled in East Austin, which segregation-era city planning had made the center of Austin's Black community.
When the United States entered World War II, the military it mobilized was segregated. Black soldiers were usually placed in separate units, and many were given construction, supply and labor duty instead of combat roles. Engineer aviation battalions were vital all the same. The Pacific war was fought island by island, and every island needed airstrips cut out of jungle and coral.
After the war, Black veterans came home to a country that still did not treat them as equals. Their service became part of the moral case for the civil rights movement that followed. Overton lived through all of it and far past it.
People & events
Richard Arvin Overton was the son of Gentry Overton Sr. and Elizabeth 'Lizzie' Franklin Overton. He grew up in Pleasant Valley, moved to Travis County as a young man, married Novella Prince in 1926, and soon settled in East Austin. In September 1942, at age thirty-six, he enlisted in the Army at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio.
He served with the 1887th Engineer Aviation Battalion, an all-Black unit, and his service took him across the Pacific, including Pearl Harbor, Iwo Jima and Okinawa. The battalion's best-known work was on Guam, where it cleared land for North Field, the airstrip that later became Andersen Air Force Base. Overton left the Army in 1945 as a Technician Fifth Grade. He eventually reached the rank of corporal and earned an expert rifle marksmanship badge along with other awards.
Back in Austin he married Wilma Galloway, and in 1948 the couple built a home in East Austin's College Heights neighborhood. He worked in a warehouse and later as a courier for the Texas Treasury Department, and he retired in the 1970s. Then he kept going for decades. He became a familiar face in the neighborhood, then a local legend, and finally a national one. In his last years he was recognized as the oldest living World War II veteran and the oldest living man in the United States, and he was honored at the White House. He died in 2018 at 112 and was buried at the Texas State Cemetery.
Its place in the American story
Overton's life connects two very different Americas. He went to war in a segregated Army, wearing his country's uniform while that country denied him equal rights at home. By the end of his life a president was honoring him, and the nation was celebrating him as one of its oldest living links to the Second World War.
The work his battalion did is easy to overlook, and it mattered. Airfields decided the Pacific war. The fields on Guam and the other Mariana Islands became bases for long-range bombers late in the war, and Andersen Air Force Base remains an important American installation today. That runway was cleared by Black engineers whose contribution was long left out of the popular story of the war.
Overton's fame at the end of his life also helped the country remember. As the World War II generation faded, he became a living face for all the men who had served in segregated units, and a chance to thank them, very late, for what they did.
If you visit
Overton's marker is in East Austin, the neighborhood he called home for most of a century and where he built his house in 1948. This part of Austin has changed a great deal in recent decades. Standing here, try to imagine the tight-knit Black community he knew as a young man.
To complete the story, visit the Texas State Cemetery on Austin's east side, where Overton is buried. It's the resting place of governors, heroes of the Texas Revolution and other notable Texans, and it's a meaningful place to pay respects to a corporal from Pleasant Valley.
Austin makes it easy to combine this with the Capitol, the museums and East Austin's historic Black churches and landmarks. Come slowly and respectfully. This marker honors a neighbor as much as a veteran.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
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